


Fast food at the crack of dawn

by TheSaintOfAllSaints



Series: DC - Of Heroes and Commoners [1]
Category: DCU, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Bat Fam, They go to a fast food join and the worker is shy, please brain let me sleep, the oc is just a underpaid waitress or whatever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-10
Updated: 2018-02-10
Packaged: 2019-03-16 12:41:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13636491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSaintOfAllSaints/pseuds/TheSaintOfAllSaints
Summary: Liz, an underpaid fast food worker serves food to the Bat family.





	Fast food at the crack of dawn

**Author's Note:**

> Once again I wrote this bullshit fic at ...... ughh.... 4 am or something while running off coffee and hot chocolate.
> 
> I tried to base it on New Earth for those that want to know but at the same time, I tried to keep it.... general.

It was a long day, nine hours of standing at the counter waiting for the clock to point to 6 am. The fast-food joint was one of the few places that stayed opened 24 hours and at 6 am her shift ended. It was only a small fast food joint with three tables and just enough space that six people could sit at the counter. Most of the customers took food to go, usually shady people doing shady things that had a shady past.

Once a big group of Two-faces men came in once. They looked tired and most of them sported injuries, but all of them hollered at Janey. Janey was a pretty young thing, with does like eyes, golden hair that  _ cascaded  _ to her shoulders and a pink cheeks. She was only 19 and shy, barely ever spoke and when she did she stuttered quietly.

The opposite of Elizabeth, she was taller than the average woman and then some, she had a crooked nose which was broken a few time in her life. Her whole body was muscular and she could deadlift at least 350kg or crush a melon with her thighs. She took to saying ‘Thick thighs are for ending lives’ among her friends.

They really had two things in common, they both lived in Gotham and the less they had to talk the happier they were.

So Liz got all of the negative comments from the men but the sight of machine guns was enough for her to keep her mouth shut, to not punch them all in the face or to slap the men’s hands away from Janey. She didn’t want to die just yet. She knew she wasn't the most conventional of beauties or the perfect image of a woman but their comments got under her skin.

They also cheered and whooped loudly because they got away with some of the money from the bank they stole from, that Batman couldn’t stop them and they all would rule the world one day. (He actually caught them a day later). So the two women shuffled around them with tight smiles that never reached their eyes, serving them the food they ordered and refilling their coffee cups. After they left both of them were relieved, the whole place lightened up, like a heavy weight had been removed. There was one major plus for them which was a  _ really  _ hefty tip.

Liz made sure to comfort Janey and to walk her home that night and a couple of nights after. It was the opposite way to Liz’s apartment but she didn’t care, she wanted to make sure she was safe. Plus, the walk cleared her head for when she had to write her college essays.

But that was last month or so, and Janey had the night off, Zeke was sick and Adam was away in Canada. So, Liz had to make do on her own that night, not that the night shift was hard, just a few stragglers came in for the “Whooper” burger special or a milkshake. Most of them were high or just finishing off their own work shift.

She could sit down at one point and write her current two-part college essay - On the future of biotechnology and its current application, and the other bit was to design her own tech.

She wanted to bash her head in with the books because, fuck, biotechnology was hard and most of all she had to fill at  _ least _ ten pages (she was thankful that she had to draw diagrams too because she would make sure to fill the whole page up with her technical drawings). Then for the question where she had to design her own technology, she also had to explain it and how it would help the people of ‘today’ - another five pages.

She was on her first draft and on her fourth page and was rambling on about Cyborg and how it could be possible to copy his advanced technology and make it attainable to the everyday man, she researched and read theories on how Cyborg got his limbs, but most of them sounded like science fiction to her. But alien technology fusing to a human being was almost as normal to the people of Metropolis as Scarecrow poisoning the water supply in Gotham.

Did she really know what she was talking about? No. Did she care? No - she was tired and wanted to sleep for the whole of next week and wake up with the perfect score, oh, and a well-paying job. She would probably read her draft on her way to college the next day and probably have a mental breakdown at her feeble attempt to sound smart. At least she has finished the second part of the question - she could bullshit about her ‘own design’ and somehow manage to make it work.

“Two cheeseburgers, four Whopper burgers, three footlong hot dogs, two bacon burgers and one avocado burger.” Liz’s head snapped up, she didn’t hear the bell chime when the customers came in. Her fake smile and fake chirpy voice were frozen halfway because  _ holy fucking shit _ it was  _ Batman  _ and his costumed pals. Seeing them up close it really baffled her how they came in so quietly. They all looked so...so… well, she couldn’t really think of a word but she would think that they would be more  _ dramatic. _

“A...a...anything to drink?” Liz noted down the order on her work pad as each member of the team chirped up with their order. Liz put on her best smile, after all, who got to hang out with Gotham’s heroes? “To go or to stay?”

“To stay,” Batman spoke, his voice was husky and had a soft grit to it which no doubt turned to a harsh growl when he wanted it to. Liz nodded and told them to make themselves comfortable, she closed her notebook, science books and stacked them in the furthest corner. She couldn’t her workstation to put the books into her bag when there were customers there, even if it was Batman. Plus the space under the counter was packed with salt, napkins and whatever else they needed to have on hand.

She started the coffee machine and started cooking the burgers, at one point she left the meat to slowly sizzle while she chopped up the avocado into fine bits so she could mix them with onion and garlic. She worked at the joint since before joining college, five days a week and she was pretty sure she could cook most of the food on the menu in her sleep by now. She made up four tall glasses of cola, two cups of water, three 7ups and two large cups of piping hot coffee. She also decided to make herself a cup of coffee and a whole pot of coffee for her customers, just in case they needed more.

After heating up the buns, and frying the avocado pulp into a circular shape she started putting them together, the hot dogs were the quickest to do and would be heated up by the time she finished. She also heated up the plates and placed the ready burgers and hotdogs on them, placed the ready plates on her serving tray and the drinks on the other tray. She turned around and saw that the blinds were pulled down, that the ‘open’ sign was turned off and the only light that was on was over the kitchen area. It gave the whole room a dim and quite a gloomy look. All they needed was a smoke machine outside and it would look like something out of a Noir film

She started handing out the food and drink, starting with the Bat-ladies, she dubbed them that when she saw the four women. The three ‘Whooper’ burgers were for the tall redhead woman, the ginger batgirl and the purple-dressed girl, the woman dressed in a black suit with gold lining got a hot dog - Another Batgirl? Liz never bothered to learn all of the names of the so-called Bat Family, some just stuck with her and some like the Batman himself was hard to miss. She paid more attention to the villains of Gotham, she wanted to know if they changed their appearance because she wanted to spot them so she could walk the other way.

Next, she set two bacon burgers for the tech-armoured bat-themed vigilante and one for Red Robin along with a coffee and a cola. Cheeseburgers for Red Hood, the other cheeseburger for the yellow bat, a hot dog for Batman, another hot dog for Nightwing and finally the avocado burger for Robin, who were all sitting at the counter. She gave the last Whopper burger for the yellow bat-themed vigilante. She was grateful for that, she didn’t need to load up the trays for them, she just turned and placed the drinks and food in front of them.

Usually, she would start a conversation with the customer during the late night hours but what could she talk about with them?  _ Any updates on what the Joker is planning? Should I start moving out of Gotham because Riddler is planning on taking over the city again? Is Two-Face planning a bank heist?  _ They all sounded lame.

So she turned to scrub the pans she just used, she didn’t want to seem like a shitty worker in front of them, or stare at them or say anything to offend them. She was almost finished drying off the kitchen utilities when she heard. “Bio-Technology?”

She turned around like a child who just got caught stealing sweets, Batman was reading her essay with Red Robin leaning to peer into the notebook, one of her study books lay open in front of Red Hood where Nightwing and Robin were pointing at pictures, laughing and saying “That’s you”. She turned her attention to the ‘Bat ladies’ who were swapping stories of their fights and giving each other tips on how to take down an opponent before focusing on Batman again.

“Ugh, yes. It was either that or engineering.”

 

“Hnn” She watched Batman’s lip tighten as he read. “Pen?”

 

She reached into her breast pocket and gave him her pen and continued to watch him as he  _ corrected  _ her work. Red Robin shrugged and bit into his burger. “I’m pretty sure he can’t help it.”

“Ah, I see.” She turned to finish off drying the plates and putting them back. Her curiosity got better of her, she would never have the chance again to ask him if she could get a Batarang as a memento. She turned around to ask only to see Batman use a knife and a fork to eat his hot dog like it was an expansive piece of steak. Her mouth quirked upwards and she tried not to stare.

“It’s so weird isn’t it?” She heard Red Hood’s gravelly voice. “Like who in their right mind eats a hot dog like that? He even does it with burgers and pizza!” Both Robin, Red Robin and Nightwing laughed. “Seriously, who in their right mind eats pizza with a fork?”

She laughed quietly at that. “I only eat Cheetos with chopsticks.” She watched as the three of them froze and gaped at her and she thought that the elder two looked kinda handsome. “I just don’t like the powder on my fingers.”

“You and B. can go stand in the corner of weird eating habits.” She shrugged and started walking around and refilling her customer’s drinks and gathering the empty dishes.

She stopped when the red-haired bat girl asked her. “So how much do you deadlift?” It took her by surprise but the red-haired woman smiled and the ginger batgirl laughed beside her. “You can’t just show off those guns” she motioned to her arms “and expect me not to ask.”

“Ughhh, around 350kg? I think, I dunno, I haven’t done it in a while.” Liz shrugged, embarrassed that she was caught off guard. “Ya know, college and stuff.” The woman nodded and Liz finally decided to ask them a question.

 

“Wh…” She began but the white lenses of the four women made her falter. “What are your names? Like… your alias? I kinda...don’t… know them...all.”

 

The purple-clad girl giggled and motioned to each of them. “Spoiler, Black Bat, Batgirl, Batwoman.” Spoiler than pointed to the men and named them “Nightwing, Batwing, Signal, Red Hood, Red Robin, Robin, Dark and Broody or y’know, Batman.”

 

Liz watched in awe as Signal waved at her and she waved back. They all seemed so normal and dedicated to the name of the Bat. “I’m honestly surprised none of you are called by a specific breed of a bat. Flying fox would’ve been cool.” She noticed that Batwing shifted uncomfortably but she wrote it off as her being too forward. “Sorry, I, ugh, I shouldn’t pry.”

She looked down and took the last of the dishes to the sink and started cleaning them. The next time she turned around they were all gone and a small pile of money was left as their payment. She stared at the empty room wide-eyed and frozen. She spun around and then she walked to the window. They were all gone.

She walked back to the counter and she looked at the small pile of money. She counted it all and put it into the cash register. She looked to the clock 4.45, she decided to pack her books up and give the counters a final wipe down. At 4.55 her co-worker came in and she left as soon as she could.

 

* * *

 

 

When she got home an hour later she decided to go over her essay again and actually read what Batman wrote. What she didn’t expect was a hefty tip and a whole page filled with website links, book recommendations and a small doodle of a dog. She smiled and she read the writing, she noted that it was neat, even and straight. She wrote another page before falling asleep on her desk.

About three months later she was visited by Red Hood and Black Bat and that how it started really, that every so often the vigilantes would come in and order something at the crack of dawn. She asked her co-workers if they ever met them but all of them shook their heads no. All of the camera feeds were always corrupt when she tried to play them back, she suspected they all had some fancy electronic distortion tech.


End file.
